Trump signs security agreement with Denmark and Greenland for military bases in the Arctic

Donald Trump has signed the long-awaited security agreement with Denmark and Greenland in a ceremony held on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly together with the prime ministers of the kingdom, Mette Frederiksen, and the semi-autonomous territory, Jens-Frederik Nielsen. The agreement provides for the United States to build two new bases on the island and have a greater military presence on the gigantic Arctic island, according to the text that was released immediately after the signing. However, it does not give Washington the “full control” of the territory that the US president had boasted about when announcing the agreement last week.

“We are going to have a great relationship, a safe relationship, we are going to coordinate and work hard,” promised the US president, who has described the arduous process of negotiating the pact as “an amazing journey.” It will be, he has promised, “magnificent for Europe, for the United States and for Greenland.”

The pact will allow “strengthening” the “deterrence capacity” of the allies. And "show our adversaries who we are. And we are going to do it together," Frederiksen stressed. The agreement has the potential to last “forever”, he insisted, and is “good for Denmark, it is good for Greenland, for the United States, NATO and, therefore, for Europe.” For his part, the Greenlandic Prime Minister has stressed that the security architecture has changed significantly in the Arctic in recent years. “Greenland matters for North American security and transatlantic security, and this agreement reflects that we understand our responsibility and act to respond to it,” Nielsen stressed. “Your safety is ours, and our safety is yours,” according to the leader. Nielsen has also highlighted the importance of NATO in the region. “We believe that it is essential to keep NATO strong, also in the Arctic, where the Alliance has a key role to play,” indicated the head of the Greenlandic Government.

The agreement provides for the opening of two new US military bases on the island, in Mestersvig and Narsarsuaq, according to the 10-page document published after the signing ceremony. In addition, the United States will modernize the one it already has in Pituffik. It may also establish “additional defense areas in Greenland and strengthen its military operations or facilities,” upon the proposal of any of the parties and after the approval of a permanent commission. If a consensus is not reached within the commission within a period of 90 days, the request will be raised to the level of vice ministers and, if an agreement is not reached then, to the level of ministers.

The pact, which the Republican announced in a message on his social networks last Friday, opens the way for greater US investments in that strategic Arctic territory and reduces the geostrategic tensions of the last year and a half between Washington and the European Union, after Trump had declared his intention to achieve control of the island, even resorting to force. The president maintains that Greenland is fundamental to the national security of the United States, and perceives it as a pillar of his project to create a defensive shield over his country, the so-called Golden Dome, with an initial budget of 175 billion dollars.

After signing, the document must be ratified by the Danish Parliament. There is already a bilateral defense agreement signed in 1951 and renewed in 2004, which gives the United States the possibility of expanding its military presence in Greenland, including the construction of new bases – it currently maintains one in the north of the territory, Pituffik – or the deployment of additional contingents of soldiers.

Sovereignty and self-determination

Both Washington, Copenhagen and Nuuk have indicated that the new agreement is based on the 1951 agreement and the possibility of building new bases. But it does not predict for the United States the levels of control that Trump boasted. The Danish and Greenlandic governments consider the pact a success because it respects the sovereignty of the Kingdom of Denmark and Greenland's right to self-determination.

The United States, for its part, considers it a triumph that the agreement, “in perpetuity” according to Trump, will remain valid even in the event that Greenland becomes independent from Denmark or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) dissolves.

But, along with satisfaction, caution has prevailed in Copenhagen and Nuuk in welcoming the agreement, waiting for it to be signed and the unknowns about its content to be cleared up. The unpredictable American president, who now seems so satisfied, may back down in the future and consider it insufficient: it has already happened, for example, with the USMCA, the free trade agreement with Mexico and Canada that he renegotiated in his first term, which he then described as excellent and which he now refers to as a joke on the part of his North American partners.

The agreement came after months of negotiations between the United States and Denmark on a possible military expansion of the world's leading power on the island, an autonomous territory belonging to the Danish State. Trump had already expressed interest in buying it during his first term, and even canceled a visit to Copenhagen when Frederiksen informed him that the island was not for sale. In the months before his second inauguration, he shocked his NATO allies by taking up the issue and even threatening an invasion, in language that he maintained until the beginning of this year. In May it was learned that the Pentagon was considering opening three new bases in Greenlandic territory.

Greenland is the largest island in the world that does not form a continent: a vast portion of land and ice between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans with a small population (56,000 inhabitants), but rich in natural resources and geostrategic value. Its location makes it a strategic territory for the control of the Arctic and the new navigation routes that open up due to the melting of that ocean. In his claims about the island, Trump has frequently alluded to Moscow and Beijing's interest in the area. The territory also has reserves of critical minerals and rare earths, necessary for the manufacture of the most advanced semiconductors.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio participated on Monday in a meeting in New York with six other countries with interests in the Arctic, prior to the General Assembly.